Hoverfly On The Cosmos Flower Bloom

Meet the Hoverfly. I have several other posts of the Hoverfly. This Hoverfly is busy on a Cosmos Flower Bloom. Hoverflies are beneficial to our gardens!

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I ran across someones post gosh it was lately, however I cant remember whose? As if I would name drop anyways which I try not to do….. The thing that was written sounded as if the writer did not realize the Hoverfly is a beneficial insect. The ultimate insect we like to see in our gardens is of course the Honey Bee, however the Honey Bee is disappearing at alarming rates. This is a sad fact. Thus many gardeners are seeing other beneficial insects helping out like this species of Hoverfly.

I also grow plants inside the house. Bare with me here as I get this thought out. I noticed as one of my Spider plants was continuously flowering and giving me seeds what on earth is pollinating this house plant? So I watched….. results? House flies were in fact pollinating this Spider Plant of mine! Of course we are not real fond of these house flies, we also have blow flies here in our area do to the cattle, other livestock in our area. Same results. These nasty , dirty insects are in fact pollinating our flowers and my house plants! I much rather have the Hoverfly then these kinds of flies! However we do not invite anything inside the house, they just show up just like everyone elses homes. Point being is pollinating. I get seeds off not only my Spider Plant……

You can see by the shadow of these shots I do use natural sunlight. The sun just happened to be positioned in the sky to cast the shadows you see.

I am not sure why we have a healthy population of such things as the Hoverfly? I have a theory that is all it is though. This theory of mine is , we had a neighboring property that was uncared for. Being uncared for , for the years it was resulted in natives plants flowering. Weeds really. These native weeds brought the Hoverfly in. A nice population of them! Now the home and property is cared for, we will just have to see what happens in 2015……

I may allow these native plants, basically weeds do there thing in one spot of the property, however the town does spray chemicals to kill such things. We do not use such things here, however we do understand why the town sprays the sides of the roads. Some of our roads are dirt, then covered with rocks. Native weeds will take over the world! Causing fires when the life cycle is over and the plants / flowers dry up. Driving over these dried up flowering, “weeds”, the undercarriage of your vehicle will start fires. Wildfires are something everyone should be mindful of in the High Desert where we can get very dry. How many folks think of just driving over dry vegetation will cause a wildfire? When I first moved over here I never thought of such a thing! A second, (maybe third?), generation rancher / farmer here made this very clear to me!

There are many species of Hoverfly! This is the common species we have. The face I have noticed seams familiar with the Hoverflies I have seen here. Big eyes! Like a fly will have, and of course the different kinds of Hoverfly, hover! They beat their wings very quick allowing them to hover over the flowers in which they help pollinate! Dont kill them, just watch what happens with your fruit, flowers etc. !